by S D Tanner
The entrance to the open area led into another wide room with tall ceilings. Like the outside of the city, the interior was also white, but a lattice of gold spread across the walls and ceiling, creating an elaborate and intricate pattern that reminded him of the web inside the engine room. White shapes emerged from the floor, and some were long like a table might be, whereas others were squat as if they were chairs. Running his glove over the back of one of the lumps his hand left a slight indent which quickly resumed its original shape. Ash leaned over the back of what was probably a chair, pushing his hand deeply into the base. His arm sunk into it up to the forearm, but when he pulled away, the surface restored itself.
Stepping away from the shape molded into the floor, Ash muttered, “That’s some freaky shit.”
His eye cover flashed a warning, indicating something was approaching them. He waved at the squad and they pulled against the gold-embroidered wall. Three then four people walked into the large room from another entrance. They were dressed in the same brilliant blue jumpsuits as the aliens on the supply ship. A familiar hissing penetrated his earpiece, making his spine stiffen. These aliens could spit acid and Jessica wouldn’t be swinging by for another four hours. It had taken six months to restore him and Rok after the last acid attack, and if they were wounded now their recovery would take time he didn’t have. Although he couldn’t explain why, he didn’t believe he could waste another six months healing inside a pod.
Just as they had on the Extrema, the aliens appeared to see them as mindless Defensors. Four blue suits walked past them, seemingly unaware or at least disinterested in their presence. Letting out a long breath in relief, he moved away from the wall toward the entrance the aliens used to enter the room. The floor appeared to curve upward, and he realized they were slowly moving higher inside the city. There didn’t seem to be any doors, only gaps in the walls large enough for three people to walk through at the same time. Hanging from the tall ceilings were shining threads, but he didn’t think they were decorative, not like the gold patterns on the walls.
Hoping no one would notice them, he maintained a steady walk as if he belonged inside the city. He didn’t know what he expected to find, but he was unimpressed. Nothing demonstrated he was dealing with a superior species capable of taking over Earth. Where was the fancy technology and heavy-duty weapons? Other than the arks and a supply ship, he hadn’t seen any evidence of a fleet, not that it mattered. If he didn’t have an army, then finding a fleet wouldn’t help him. He didn’t know what he hoped to find inside the floating city. Rok had called it a mission, but that suggested he had an objective, only he didn’t. All they’d learned on Earth was they were out of their depth, caught inside a trap they couldn’t even frame. He didn’t even know how to pick a human from an alien, other than one wore a blue jumpsuit. It was the core of his argument with Judge about Lolo. Where he saw a deadly enemy, Judge only saw a victim and someone he needed to protect.
His steady pace was interrupted by a shrieking sound that set his deadened nerves on edge. “What the hell is that?”
“I don’t like it,” Rok replied.
Although it didn’t sound human, the tone and pitch was crying for help. The desperate screeching made him quicken his pace.
Judge had stopped on the sloping path, flicking up the faceplate on his helmet. “Upper left.”
The curved and elevated path appeared to be winding around the walls, gradually moving them higher inside the structure. At every thirty or so feet, there was a gaping entrance leading into another white room, where the ceilings were at least twenty feet high and glistening. Knotted white strands hung down as if they were the very fibers of the building. Flicking up his own faceplate, he was surprised that the air was sweet, as if he were inside a honeypot. The rooms and corridors had the molded look of a wasp nest, making him suspect the city wasn’t manufactured, but more likely a repurposed substance from another planet.
Another wailing shriek made his head jerk to the left. White floors against matching walls with only gaps for doors made everything blend together, so that nothing stood out. Breaking into a run, he and the squad chased the noise. Driven by the sound of suffering, he forgot about the battle for the arks and even his own sleepers. All he wanted to do was stop the pain, no matter what the cost.
“Go left!” Judge called.
Swerving as ordered, he flew through one of the gaps and stopped. Partially buried inside the wall was a body, but it wasn’t humanoid or even an animal he recognized. It was barely two feet long with four legs, each with tiny paws at the end, and the little creature was wriggling and trying to free itself. The head was round and fluffy like its body, and the stubby, pink snout matched the color of its fur.
Another wailing shriek cut across the room, and then the creature became still, as if exhausted by the fight. Unlike the other rooms, the walls inside this one were lumpy, making him wonder if the city was absorbing the fluffy animal. Shouldering his gun, he walked over to the creature and seeing him approach, its blue eyes grew wide with fear.
He pulled off his glove, stroking the fur on the side of its face. “Easy, little guy. We’ll get you out.”
Seeming to understand his words, its wails became a soft whimper. Judge had joined him and was running his hands under the fur that was stuck to the wall. “Why would anyone do this?”
“Do what?”
“Glue an animal to a wall.”
Rok and Ash were about six feet away examining one of the lumps. As he pulled a blade from his belt, Ash said, “I don’t think it’s glued.”
When Ash ran the knife down the lump in the wall, a gush of brown fluid spilled onto the floor and the furry creature started shrieking again.
“That’s disgusting,” Rok said angrily.
Continuing to stroke the animal, he glanced at Judge. “This isn’t a city, is it?”
“Not like one we’ve ever seen before.”
Judge pulled a blade from his tactical vest, and the creature’s eyes widened with worry. Whimpering and crying, it waved its paws feebly, seemingly resigned to its fate.
“Easy, little guy. We need to cut you free.”
While Judge ran the blade into the wall, he gently tugged the furry body toward him. The creature slowly came loose until it was only attached to the wall by a patch of fur. Realizing it was free, the little animal launched from the wall, wrapping its paws around his neck. Burying its head under his chin, it whimpered and chattered into the collar on his armor.
Trying to peer at its buried face, Ash asked, “What is it?”
Rok snorted with amusement. “You can really pull ‘em, Tag. First a robot and now a beanie doll.”
“What was the wall doing?” Judge asked. “Eating it?”
Absentmindedly stroking the furry creature, he looked at the puddle of brown staining the pristine white floor. It should have sat on the surface, but it was already draining away as if the floor was porous. Very soon, there would be no evidence anything had been there, much less a creature like the one clinging to him.
“I think the city is alive and Beanie was its dinner.”
Judge turned and looked around the room. “How can a city be alive?”
Shrugging at Judge’s question only made Beanie cling even more tightly to him. He couldn’t explain what kind of alien would be the size of a floating city, or what it was doing on Earth, but if the cities were alive, then they were just one more species under the control of their enemy.
“Tag, check this out!” Rok called.
While he and Judge had been examining the lumpy wall, Rok had already moved through another gap. Following the sound of his voice, he found himself inside the next room. This one was full of tubes, some filled with tiny embryos, and others with partially formed creatures like the one clinging to his neck.
“What am I looking at?”
“Farming,” Judge replied. Pointing to Beanie, he added, “I’m guessing they breed them t
o feed the city.”
“I’ve never seen anything like Beanie before. Where did it come from?”
Judge shrugged. “Where did the city and the aliens come from?”
Ash and Rok had already lost interest in the room and were walking into the next chamber. “There’s more in here, but they’re not the same.”
Pulling Beanie from his neck, he lifted it until it was looking him in the eye. “I don’t mind giving you ride, Beanie, but you’ve got to travel horseback style.” He pushed the furry bundle toward the back of his neck and, seeming to understand, Beanie clambered onto his shoulders.
Shaking his head at him, Judge said irritably, “You should show the same compassion for Lolo.”
Walking toward the gap leading to the next chamber, he replied sharply, “Beanie isn’t the same and you know it.”
The next room was more disgusting than the last. Floor to ceiling tubes contained creatures he’d never seen before. Some had gray-colored, elongated limbs with round heads and black eyes. Others reminded him of oversized cockroaches, complete with folded wings and antennae. More tubes contained meaty creatures with thickset arms and legs covered in a scaly skin. Every tube was different and there was more than one of each species crammed inside. They appeared to be suspended in fluid and were clearly conscious. Packed tightly inside the tubes, they could only stare back at them, unable to move or even look away.
His jaw tightened with disgust. “How innocent is Lolo now, Judge?” Looking at the mournful expression on the face of an imprisoned reptilian alien, he shook his head. “They’ll use anything they find, including you it seems.”
Judge was studying a reptilian looking creature curled up inside one of the tubes at the other end of the long room, and didn’t bother replying to his question, not that there was an answer he could have given that would have satisfied him.
“Can we leave this?” Ash asked.
Walking from the back of the room, Judge replied, “If we do anything then they’ll know we broke our programming.”
Although Judge didn’t always agree with him, he never went against his orders. His pig-headed commitment to Lolo was odd, making him wonder if he was missing something. What did Judge know that he didn’t? What could he know? They were both caught inside the same trap, cornered by the same master. Although his squad might appear to be free, they were all being held prisoner in a world they no longer understood. In protecting Lolo, Judge was defending their master, which only proved to him how much of a slave he had become. The logic was clear as day to him, but the fact Judge would put their friendship at risk for their enemy made him wonder if he was wrong. He needed Judge, without him he was only half a leader. Maybe Jessica was right and he needed to understand where Judge was coming from.
“Aww, man, this is not good,” Rok said, sounding worried.
Turning and scanning the room, he realized Rok had already moved into the next chamber. Following the sound of his voice, he found the gap in the wall he must have walked through. What he saw next solidified his growing hatred for the aliens. All thoughts of seeing Judge’s point of view flew from his mind, as he stalked across the room, knowing he would kill the next enemy alien he saw even if it was Lolo.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: Mindful Prison
She was naked and pinned to the wall like a butterfly on a board. Attached to her head were web-like wires. Thicker tubes punctured her torso, clearly feeding her with the nutrients that were keeping her alive. More wires and tubes ran from her joints until her body was so meshed with the wall, it was hard to know where she began and it ended. At least twelve feet from the floor, all he could do was look up at her in horror. Seeming to sense his shock, Beanie let out a sympathetic whimper.
He and Rok stood staring at the body suspended so that it hung outward from the wall. Taking a step toward her, he said, “We have to get her down.”
“Can we?” Rok asked, and he understood why.
Jessica’s body was so heavily wired into the city he wasn’t sure she could be taken down without killing her. The wires firmly held her head against the angled wall. Spread-eagled so that her full breasts hung down and her trim belly formed a rounded gut, she was completely suspended inside a web of wires and tubes.
Judge appeared by his side. “Is that Jess?”
Although most of her body was covered in wires, Jessica’s face loomed over his. Her eyes were closed and her mouth parted just wide enough to allow a tube inside. Even from beneath her body, he could see her chest was rhythmically rising and falling, proving she was still alive.
His voice sounded bitter. “How innocent is Lolo now, Judge?”
Sighing loudly, Judge simply shook his head. “Climb on my shoulders. Check if she’s conscious.”
After handing Beanie to Ash, Rok boosted him so he could get both feet onto Judge’s shoulders. Judge straightened and stepped forward to keep his balance. Reaching up to the ceiling, he held onto one of the thick tubes surrounding Jessica’s body and, with his faceplate up, he looked directly into her face.
“Jessica, can you hear me?”
Now closer to Jessica’s face, her mouth was constantly moving as if she were grinding her teeth or muttering to herself. How long had the aliens held her in suspension, using her mind to control the robot versions of herself on the arks?
Still holding onto the tube in the wall, he touched her face, finding it faintly warm. “Jessica, it’s Tag.”
Her eyes didn’t open, nor did anything about her suggest she was aware of his presence. Wherever Jessica’s mind was, it wasn’t inside the chamber or with her body. The trap holding her was more than physical, it held control of her mind, forcing her to do whatever the aliens wanted. It seemed he couldn’t protect anyone. Daisy was dead and Jessica was more than a prisoner, she was being tortured.
Frustrated, he tugged at the tube that disappeared between her almost white lips. Jessica’s body jerked and she retched. A trickle of blood ran down the thick part of her bottom lip, forming a drip that landed on his shoulder. Running his thumb along her lip, the blood left a red smear on his glove. More thick tubes cut holes into the back of her neck, and the spider like strands weaved into her head, entering through her skull, eyes and ears. The rest of body had been brutally opened by tubes flowing fluids in and out of her. The fine web was so intertwined throughout her body, it covered her like a delicate gown. She was literally in the clutches of the aliens, and there was no way to free her without killing her. Despair ripped through him, but before he could turn it into rage, he gently touched her face again. “I’ll get you out of here, Jessica. You have my word. I won’t leave you here.”
Waving to Judge, he pointed at the floor. Once he was close enough to the ground, he jumped from Judge’s shoulders.
“Well?” Rok demanded.
He shook his head. “She’s wired in tight.”
Rok’s eyes widened in shock. “Are you gonna leave her here?” Looking up at Jessica, he sounded horrified. “Like this? In a torture chamber.”
Although most of what came out of Rok’s mouth wasn’t worth the air it wasted, this time he was right. In an hour, the robot version of Jessica would swing by the city, teleporting them to safety, and yet the real woman would remain bolted to a wall inside an alien city. They couldn’t leave her this way, but he didn’t want to kill her, which left him with a problem. He couldn’t tear her away from the wall without making her bleed, but if he left her then the aliens would keep hurting her. Killing her would have been an option, but the robot version of Jessica would cease to function, and she was what controlled the ark.
He didn’t want it to be true, but he needed Jessica to stay where she was until he worked out how to free her. “We can’t free her, not without killing her.”
Using his KLAW to point at Jessica, Rok said, “I think being dead is better than being that.”
Killing Jessica would mean he’d given up, and he put his hand on the barrel of the KLAW, pu
shing it downward. “Don’t do it, Rok.”
Lowering the barrel of the KLAW, Rok almost stamped his foot in frustration. “This place is a shithole, Tag! We don’t even know if the city isn’t another prisoner.”
Ash nodded. “There’s something funny about this city. It’s…it’s alive, you know, like a person.”
It was an astute observation. Everything the aliens captured was kept alive in some fashion so it could be used. The only reason they were allowed to roam was their purpose was to be puppet soldiers that couldn’t be killed. Had Jessica not broken their protocols, then they would still be a tool controlled by the aliens. Looking up at Jessica’s blank expression, he wondered just how aware she was. By using the robot versions of Jessica on the arks, she’d managed to break their protocols and bring them to Earth. Maybe she was alive inside her prison, desperately trying to change what was happening on Earth. If the aliens were pulling one set of strings, the human version of Jessica was tugging on her own, and they were the rope between the two forces vying for control.
“Jessica! What do you want us to do?”
Judge looked at him in surprise. “She can’t answer you, Tag.” Moving until he stood facing him, Judge said sternly, “Man up, Tag. Jessica chose you for a reason. Don’t let her down, not like you did Lisa.”
Just mentioning Lisa reminded him of Daisy, and the anger that had been building since he woke erupted inside him. Rage was called mindless for a reason and it wiped away his logic, including his survival instinct. Well-considered actions weren’t getting him anywhere, all he’d found was one disgusting problem after another. The aliens were so in control of Earth, they’d decorated their forward operating base with even more prisoners, keeping them in tubes until they found a use for them.
“We go red on their ass.”